This prototype Electric Tram is being tested in China, it runs on white painted lines in the road. Its highly advanced batteries give it amazing serviceability and it carries over 300 people.

Everyday I’m sent examples of new ways of developing electric transport capabilities. From cars to aeroplanes the future is electric and combined with the enormous development of renewable energy we are entering a new fossil fuel free era.

We can dramatically reduce pollution which effects everyone of us going about our daily routine.

We can begin to reverse the worst forecasts of climate change and together make our Planet once again safe for the generations to come.

Join us in spreading the word that the UK should be taking a lead in developing renewable energy and of course majoring on moving from petrol/diesel powered transport to electric or eventually even hydrogen.

None of our political parties are focussing on renewable energy or climate change the most important issues of our times. Hold your potential MP’s locally to account and make commitments of support on both subjects.

Our commitment is clear, to the Planet, to landscape, to people and of course to the Natural World.

Tell us your own stories about installing solar, buying an electric car anything that will give confidence to other people thinking of making changes.

Forward our website details to all your friends, relatives and colleagues. Lets shout about this new energy and really get the show on the road here in the UK.

The latest reports from the USA highlights that bats are being killed by wind turbines is great numbers. However with small adjustments to the revolution speed we can hugely reduce the number of deaths and cause very little reduction in energy output.

The last report I saw from the UK was by RSPB and indicated that WT’s did not cause anything but minor mortality to bats.

I don’t know which is right or wrong and how much the technology is different say from the States to European models. But its clear we do need to look out for our little friends and rather like Bees understand and rejoice in the work they do for us in reducing insect populations and their effects on crops.

Last week opponents of Wind Energy won yet another victory in stopping the Slyers Lane proposal.
This was indeed a sad day for Dorset whose target for clean energy is now in tatters.
This horrendous not in my backyard approach of a minority of Dorset’s people will no doubt comeback to haunt them one day soon when Fracking becomes the goto alternative for our County.
If anyone thinks that WT’s are a threat compared with the ravages of Fracking then they are nuts.
So to the next generation I say sorry, sorry we could not win the argument for you.
Remember its our Country and when its your time to vote next think about how the current Government have decimated the renewable energy industry.
Come forward Mr Corbin and The Green Party we want and need alternative thinking !!

Wind Turbines in Dorset? Planning Committee says NO

I recently attended a wind turbine planning determination in a crowded village hall when the planning committee (well 6 of the 11 members attended) decided the fate of an application for 4 large wind turbines. We all listened to officers of the council and AONB explain the landscape and heritage sensitivities (the turbines would be seen in the setting of listed buildings and the beautiful Dorset landscape) followed by numerous speakers against and for the application.

Those opposed to the application made the point that our landscape must be preserved, that the turbines would be seen from village houses and gardens and even that wind turbines damage people’s health. The CPRE claimed that renewable energy targets in Dorset had been exceeded so no new installations were needed. Each speaker received rapturous applause.

I have witnessed a few campaigns to oppose wind turbine applications in Somerset and Dorset. There is usually assistance from outside organisations. Meetings, leaflets and doorstep petitions are arranged. The purpose – of course – is to raise anxiety levels. Misinformation is spread such as; bird and bat populations are put at risk; infra sound prevents people sleeping and gives them headaches; house prices will fall and tourists will stay away. Wind turbines are inefficient and generate hardly anything. Sometimes photographs that exaggerate the scale are published.

In reality, the choice to approve or not – as the officers and members present acknowledged –is justified on the basis of a subjective view of landscape and visual aesthetics.

About seven of us spoke up in favour of the application. It was explained that climate change is an issue that needs to be dealt with so urgently we need to move to 100% of our electricity from renewables ASAP, that wind turbines are the cheapest technology but that there are very sites suitable for their installation in Dorset.

When I spoke, looking out onto the big audience of grey haired baby boomers while younger people were at work, I realised just where the divide in opinion lay. The majority of the audience – many retired to timeless Hardy’s Dorset – would not sacrifice their views from around the village to give the younger generation a better future. Yet just think what the generation before the baby boomers sacrificed in the 30s, 40s and 50s!

Anyone wanting to live in Hardy’s Dorset should stop using electricity, swap their car for a horse and cart, live in a very small draughty house and campaign to take out pylons and large roads. If we walk backwards into the future, we will suffer because we can’t see where we are going.

I spoke up for farmers. They may be sitting on land and property worth millions with large sums flowing through their business but their disposable income can be modest. They work very long hours as standard and consider themselves guardians of the land (and landscape) which they expect to pass on to their children rather than realize paper wealth.

I was once told by a farmer – only half-jokingly – that I shouldn’t expect him to take my opinions on local matters seriously because my family had not been in Dorset since Saxon times. Despite that comment, farmers are usually quiet, self-effacing, not prone to voicing their opinions and actually can be intimidated.

Wind turbines make sense to farmers because they give resource efficient future financial security. The opposing camp are very ably led by people some of which, have moved into the area to retire. They put high value on the landscape the farming community have created and look after, but look to the past rather than the constant change and planning for the future they may have experienced in their own working lives.

The media are underestimating the connection between peoples voting intentions and their views on climate change. The Green surge is largely due to younger people with a strong sense of injustice against their generation. Baby boomers have had it good with their jetting around the world on holiday, big cars and houses by mortgaging their children’s and grandchildren’s futures (the deficit.) This put the carbon in the atmosphere that puts future generations in jeopardy.

Dorset Renewable Energy Co

Could we create our own local Power Co with a win for the people, win for the investors and of course a win for the Planet. See what you think !

The socio-economic power of wind energy in remote areas

Jan 19, 2015

Wind projects with a socio-economic slant need not be charity cases. More examples of wind power projects in emerging markets and remote areas are showing the wider economic benefits of this natural resource from Africa to Chile. We learn which companies…

Companies making tracks in emerging wind power markets, such as Chile, include Acciona. President Michelle Bachelet attended this month’s opening ceremony for Punta Palmeras, a wind farm equipped with 3 MW Acciona Windpower turbines, the machines…

By Katherine Steiner-Dicks

In November of last year, delegates at a South African Wind Energy Association talk heard that wind energy is now set to make a contribution of more than ZAR 7bn to communities and socio-economic development over the next 20 years in South Africa. With five wind farms in full operation, 22 large-scale wind farms currently under construction and another 700 MW expected to be awarded imminently, the total capacity amounts to 2684MW set to be installed. Each of these developments has committed significant financial investment to nearby communities, according to the Association.

“Utility scale wind energy is already boosting economic development in South Africa. Industry and government are committed to ensuring that these benefits are realised by small business and local communities across the country,” explains Dipolelo Elford, Chairperson of the South African Wind Energy Association (SAWEA).

Local benefits factored in

As per the design of the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producers Procurement Programme (REIPPPP), each utility-scale wind farm invests a percentage of its revenue towards socio-economic development; and in some cases enterprise development in the areas surrounding the farm. Additionally, shares in the wind farm project company are allocated to an entity representing local residents within a 50km radius.

“The revenue percentage and dividends from the shares in the farm will benefit the local economies and residents over the full lifetime of the wind farms: 20 years. The amounts invested will be substantial – more than ZAR 7bn based just on current allocations, with more large scale development expected through to 2030. This figure compares favourably to that of direct investments made into communities in more mature wind energy markets in Europe and the United States,” said the SAWEA.

Direct, indirect and induced employment opportunities are created during all stages of the development, implementation and operations and maintenance of the wind farms, yet only a fraction of direct jobs are accounted for in the REIPPPP.

With the current awarded installed capacity and future IRP2010 allocation, a conservative figure of 77,700 cumulative jobs (person-years) may be created by 2030, 54,400 in the 20 year O&M period. This results in a minimum of 3,600 direct long-term and sustainable jobs, predominantly for semi-skilled and skilled individuals in local communities.

All about connections

Today, more than 1.3 billion people across the globe lack access to affordable and reliable electricity – with dramatic consequences for human health, education, and economic well-being. But more than 50 million of those live in areas with abundant wind resources.

A pioneering project called, Wind for Prosperity, started in 2011, when Vestas’ CMO, Morten Albæk, had the idea to connect two data sets; wind data and areas with the highest level of child mortality.

Two companies that are harnessing their know-how for “wind empowerment” are ABB and Vestas. According to the partnership, many such communities rely on diesel generators to supply what power they have, which is an expensive, polluting and potentially uncertain power source.

The Wind for Prosperity initiative is based on a hybrid wind-diesel electricity generating system made up of ABB microgrid power stabilization solutions and factory-refurbished Vestas wind turbines with advanced diesel power generation capability.

The system combines ABB’s grid modelling, integration engineering and electrical system specification process with Vestas’ leading hybrid wind-diesel turbine technology to create a stable, reliable power source and electrical infrastructure for remote, energy-poor areas not linked to a power grid.

Powering remote placesand “new opportunities”

Wind for Prosperity will aim to create a world of “new opportunities” by accelerating access to clean water, healthcare, irrigation, education, communications infrastructure, and other social and economic benefits. It is different to most other corporate initiatives to alleviate poverty. The concept is commercially-based and is more scalable and sustainable than efforts purely reliant on philanthropy and donations.

Designed to increase capacity and reduce the cost and environmental impact of electrical generation in remote places, the initiative is an opportunity for business, government, and financial institutions to join forces and improve lives while generating risk-adjusted returns for private investors, say the partnering companies.

“A typical microgrid power system is made up of many parts, which must be integrated to work together,” says Massimo Danieli, Head of ABB’s Power Generation business, a part of the company’s Power Systems division.

ABB says interest in decentralised or off-grid electricity generation is growing as developing countries grapple with the challenges of delivering electricity to rural and remote locations. However, extending the existing grid is often challenging in terms of transmission extension costs, power quality and limited demand in isolated areas and sparsely populated zones. This has been experienced even in burgeoning wind power markets, such as South Africa.

Fuel-powered microgrids play a key role in bringing electricity to these areas, but are also vulnerable to fuel price increases and the logistical challenge of delivering fuel to remote places. This has given rise to the development of renewable energies as an additional or main source of generation in fuel-powered microgrids.

Kenya focus

The Wind for Prosperity initiative is focusing on rural Kenya to start, where 13 communities – home to more than 200,000 people – have been identified as potential project areas, in coordination with Kenyan government agencies. The scheme is expected to supply electricity at significant lower cost than diesel-only power production.

In addition to Africa, Wind for Prosperity partners are also exploring potential projects in other geographical areas with similar needs. The initiative plans to install hybrid power generation systems reaching at least one million people in the coming years.

For these projects, ABB is providing its PowerStoreTM technology, microgrid controller and other equipment on a site-to-site basis to keep the hybrid wind systems stable and provide grid-quality electrical power, in addition to related electrical infrastructure and localised service solutions.

ABB’s microgrid technology is designed to manage renewable energy generation in isolated grids and ensure utility-grade power quality and grid stability, as well as very high levels of wind and solar power penetration, helping to reduce both emissions and dependency on fossil fuel. ABB has more than 80 microgrid project references worldwide, including consulting, key products in microgrid systems, and relentless project execution.

Vestas is supplying factory refurbished Vestas wind turbines, wind simulation studies for site selection and site designs, and EPC services for wind turbines, including foundations, power cables and transformers, as well as localised wind turbine service solutions.

Reactivating the other America

Another region with vast potential for wind power and remote area grid access is Latin America, notably Chile. In 2014 the country proudly announced the completion of El Arrayan farm, located on a coastal hillside 400km (250 miles) north of the capital city of Santiago. The project, the largest of its kind in the region, was built at a cost of $300m (£180m), according to news reports, and includes 50 turbines with an installed capacity of 115MW.

Some 70% of the energy the farm generates will be used to power a large copper mine, Los Pelambres, in the Chilean Andes. The rest will be sold on the open market, said a BBC report.

But despite its size, it represents less than 1% of Chile’s total electricity generating capacity.
Jointly owned by US company Pattern Energy and Chilean mining giant Antofagasta Minerals, El Arrayan will provide Los Pelambres with 20% of its energy needs.

Chile President Michelle Bachelet said as she inaugurated the farm: “I hope this project acts as a powerful stimulus for other companies in the mining sector to start opting for this kind of energy.”

It was reported by FC Business Intelligence in April 2014 that Jorge Rosenblut, President of Endesa Chile, one of the largest utilities in the country, said that there is an urgent need for Chile to “reactivate” the electricity sector.

Rosenblut said in a speech at the Enersis annual convention (Enersis is part of the Endesa Group) that the new government must focus on the development of local sources of energy that are both sustainable and competitive.

Chile is historically known for lacking internal conventional energy resources. This situation has made the country import the fuels needed for electricity generation, and thus making them dependent on their partners’ economy fluctuations. And that is not a sustainable option for any country.

According to Rosenblut, the import of fuels represents between 4% and 5% of the overall imports that arrive in Chile. To overturn this situation he stated the need to invest in local energies that would reduce the energy dependence of the country.

Sign of things to come

Seasoned wind players are putting more of their executives on the ground in South America. Wind Energy Update recently reported that José Antonio Miranda has been appointed as Gamesa’s chief executive officer for the entire Latin American region. He has been chosen for this role after leading Gamesa China for four years.

Miranda, who joined Gamesa in 2007 as managing director of the Electric Components Division, was appointed in 2011 CEO of China, a region that has become a key global production and supply hub of Gamesa. The company is present in China in its capacity as OEM and wind farm developer where it won orders for the supply of 450 MW in 2014.

Other companies making tracks in the country include Acciona. President Michelle Bachelet attended this month’s opening ceremony for Punta Palmeras, a wind farm equipped with 3 MW Acciona Windpower turbines, the machines with the widest power range installed in Chile.

The farm is the first of its kind that Acciona has installed in the country. This will be followed by the construction of wind and photovoltaic plants in Chile up to an overall capacity of 255 MW, with an estimated investment of EUR400m.

In his speech, Acciona President José Manuel Entrecanales highlighted the attractiveness of Chile for international investors.

“You have a stable economy with infrastructure needs, talented businesspeople and human resources, political and social stability, enormous quantities of natural resources, and above all, a long and solid tradition of legal certainty and stability. This set of values is not easy to find, and I would even go as far as to say that your ability to attract international investment is practically unlimited.”

The Punta Palmeras wind farm, located in the municipality of Canela (Coquimbo region) has a capacity of 45MW. It consists of fifteen 3-megwatt AW 116/3000 turbines of Acciona Windpower technology, with the biggest power range of any turbine in service in Chile. The 116-meter-diameter rotors and the nacelles are mounted on 92-meter-high steel towers.

The electric power produced by the wind farm – around 124 GWh per year – will be sold to Colbún in the Central Interconnected System (SIC) of Chile under a 12-year contract. The contract has the potential to be extended if the customer wishes.

President Bachelet said, “It is already a fact, not a promise: Chile is taking firm steps towards diversifying its energy matrix” and pointed out that the investment made by Acciona confirms that “the energy sector is a very important source of dynamism for our economy, and we should take advantage of it”.

The President added that, through the Energy Agenda set up by her government, “we have emerged from the state of slumber from which investments in energy suffered, and we have been able to drive many changes that our economy and society urgently needed in the field of energy.”

New Spanish Blameless Wind Turbines

Big news from Spain, the launch of bladeless wind turbine’s indeed.

50% less cost, even better rates of energy generation they also have less impact on the landscape, people and wildlife.
Wow with all those plus’s can we assume that all the Anti’s will now give up on their opposition and get fully behind the Countries move towards fossil free energy generation.

The wind has been our friend since the beginning of time with transport, food production and even drying our clothes before tumble dryers were even invented. So lets embrace its force and use it for the common good.

If you would like to comment on this or any other subject please go to our blog comment page or the comment section below this article.

If you are going to move to a new home soon, you might want to consider ways to make it more energy efficient and green. While it is true that the whole situation is stressful enough, indicated by the fact many surveys rank this among the most difficult tasks one has to deal with in life, it is also true that moving house presents many new opportunities.

One of the most important things you can consider for your home is implementing green technology and features. Now is the perfect opportunity to become a better eco-friendly person, start a new life in your new and improved home. Relocation to a new place is your opportunity to live in a home that is green and less taxing on the environment.

Here are some projects you can consider:

Rainwater harvest system – that is one thing you should definitely consider for your new home. An RHS allows the collection of rainwater from your rooftop, which would normally go to waste. It is a precious resource, which the system will store in a tank, allowing you to utilise it later for various needs. Collected rainwater can easily be used for various cleaning tasks, all of which you will have to perform a lot of after relocation. The benefits of having an RHS installed in your home are huge – it can save you up to 50% of your water bill, which is not a small amount at all.

Solar panels – solar power has become a widespread reality. Many homes have panels installed, and this is very good, because it is a great way of saving energy and utilising a renewable source for power. The thing to consider before moving house to a place with solar panels is that the investment is a rather large one. You can expect a long-term return, but that should not stop you from implementing this project in your home.

Energy efficient electronics – if you want to pay less for moving services, you can leave part of your old electronics behind or sell them in order to acquire new and more energy efficient ones. This is definitely something to consider, because it not only makes your move easier, but also makes your new home much more eco-friendly and green.

Wind turbine – another great way of making your home more eco-friendly is to harness the power of the winds by mounting a wind turbine on the roof of your new home. Even small models can make quite a difference in reducing your electricity bill. Of course, you have to keep in mind whether or not the conditions are good – your home must be in an area with plenty of winds, otherwise the turbine will not produce electricity.

It is by implementing these 4 features in your new home that you can make it green and eco-friendly. Definitely consider the upgrades, because they are worth it and their positive impact on the environment will be noticeable.

This post is by Guest Energizer Sofia Lewis for: Islington Van and Man Hire. She is a passionate freelance article writer and blogger. She is inspired by home improvement projects and writes mainly about house removals, storage, office relocation, green living home solutions, other home related topics.

Wind Turbine Technology and the Lake Turkana Project

For centuries, humans have utilized wind energy through traditional windmills. The Netherlands has played a prominent role in the development of this sector, due to its geographic conditions. It has claimed significant portions of land through a complex water management system, driven by windmill power.

The traditional windmill has for long kept its original concept, with a horizontal shaft connected to the wind vanes, which in turn was connected to a vertical shaft through a right angle transmission. This rotating shaft was utilized for the particular purpose of the windmill.

It was only towards the end of the 1970s and early 80s that the windmill was seriously developed into modern turbines for generating electricity. Various test parks were built and it became a serious alternative method to generate electricity. The first significant wind turbines had a capacity of 100 kW, with steel wind blades.

Since the early 90s, the developments in wind technology accelerated. Computer systems were incorporated to optimize the utilization and efficiency of the turbines. The capacity increased significantly with new, larger mills and better materials. Also the safety was drastically improved by using stronger, but also lighter materials.

In addition, the knowledge and insight in wind streams and climatological circumstances further advanced, allowing the modern wind turbines to better anticipate the rapidly changing circumstances during showers, storms and other turbulent situations. The wind turbines were also equipped with lightning conduction and (if necessary) heating systems to prevent icing on the blades.

Meanwhile, the scale of the turbines continued to grow. Whereas the capacity of the largest wind turbine in 1990 had a capacity of 225 kW, today’s turbines can produce up to 6 MW each. The diameter of the rotor increased from 27 to 112 meters, and the shaft height (hub height) from 30 to 125 meters.

The latest models are equipped with sensors to determine undesired vibrations and allow the computer controlling system to take preventive measures. These sensors also make it possible to control the rotors individually, adjusting the angle of each blade independently during every rotation. This improves the efficiency, since the wind conditions for the blade in upright position differs from the ones below.

Don’t believe what you hear that wind energy turbines are not efficient its not true and developing our on-shore and off shore wind farms will give the UK greater energy sustainability

Just take a look at this project in Kenya !!

Lake Turkana Wind Project

The Lake Turkana Wind Power Project (LTWP) aims to provide 300MW of reliable, low cost wind power to the Kenya national grid, equivalent to approximately 20% of the current installed electricity generating capacity. The Project is of significant strategic benefit to Kenya, and at more than €620 million will be the largest single private investment in Kenya’s history. The wind farm site, covering 40,000 acres (162km2), is located in Loyangalani District, Marsabit West County, in north-eastern Kenya, approximately 50km north of South Horr Township.

The Project will comprise 365 wind turbines (each with a capacity of 850 kW), the associated overhead electric grid collection system and a high voltage substation. The Project also includes upgrading of the existing road from Laisamis to the wind farm site, a distance of approximately 204km, as well as an access road network in and around the site for construction, operations and maintenance. The Kenya Electricity Transmission Company Ltd (Ketraco) is constructing a double circuit 400kv, 428km transmission line to deliver the LTWP electricity along with power from other future plants to the national grid.

The power produced will be bought at a fixed price by Kenya Power (KPLC) over a 20-year period in accordance with the signed Power Purchase Agreement (PPA).

Norfund has supported the development of the project with NOK 13.6 million. When the project is ready for ordinary investment (fist half of 2014), Norfund will take a substantial equity share in the project company.

Vince Adams comments:
"Latest thoughts from the USA and Jack Olver
“As you know I read a lot about this problem. Yesterday a pipeline broke along the California Coast. It was a small spill, only 21,000 gallons made it to the ocean of the 120,000 gallons spilled. That makes insignificant in most parts of the world but a big deal here in California. Meanwhile the Alberta oil sands lie under 140,000 square kilometers of Canadian forest – kiss those trees and all the wildlife that live there goodbye. The Deepwater Horizon spill is still killing dolphins and the Exxon Valdez is still killing sea otters. Both those ocean spills killed a lot of birds and other sea creatures too and the planktonic base of the food web was devastated. Mexico just had a rig explode and kill four people but no spill was reported. On land we have the constant pollution from the intentional burning of fossil fuels for energy as well as the continued practice of mountain top coal mining. Google Mountain top coal mining and click images to see some real devastation and then take a look at the Wikipedia article on that subject.
Wind energy does have some problems, as does solar . But these problems can and will be addressed as more sustainable materials and practices come into play. Fossil fuels have had almost two centuries of use and they have gotten nothing but dirtier”.
"
May 25, 2015 a 11:55 am

In the recent years, the rising costs of energy have boosted the overall cost of living to all new heights. Thus, it now becomes necessary for the homeowners to set their sights on the alternative energy sources. These sources reduce both, energy dependence and expense to a significant amount.

As the fear of ending conventional sources of energy rises, the homemakers have started weighing other options for their energy consumption. More and more people now ought to invest in alternative energy resources of energy, and it seems to be a growing market. Along this, a number of states now offer rebates, tax credits, and other incentives to promote clean energy. So, now it’s your turn to switch to these energy sources, before it gets too late. Read out here to find some promising solutions, which can help power your home efficiently and effectively:

Solar

When it comes to renewable sources, ‘Solar energy’ is the first to strike your brain. The reason for its ever increasing popularity is that it is the easiest solution, or better say, one of the most easily accessible. For your home, all you need is the photo-voltaic solar panels, batteries and an inverter.

The performance depends greatly on the region you are residing, for example, the location having sunny and brighter days for most of the time per year will show better results. But, that doesn’t mean the areas with less sunlight cannot use solar panels. Even, if the temperature falls off, the solar energy users can still keep their homes warm and bright.

Another advantage of solar energy is that it demands a little maintenance. The solar panels once installed, can provide large amounts of electricity and don’t ask for repairs often.

Wind

Do you know that wind energy is the second most widely used renewable source? But, many homemakers associate it with those mammoth wind farms, neglecting their usage at home. The fact which remains silent is that there are a number of small sized turbines available, perfect for producing a significant amount of energy.

So, it is a valuable solution for those looking for non- conventional sources. The speed of the wind in your region will decide over the right solution for your home. You can seek help from the weather services, they will let you know the average wind speed in your region.

Undoubtedly, bigger turbines are capable of generating a large amount of energy, but you can use a 10-kilowatt turbine for your home. It is 100 feet tall, the turbine is nearly 23 feet and is sufficient to produce enough energy for a house.

Micro Hydro Electricity

This is an effective solution and its installation is much easier. Warning!!! – It is ideal only if you live near moving water.

All you need is to place a pipe, running from the higher area (where water is flowing) to a lower piece of ground. As the water moves downhill, turns the turbine at the end of the pipe, energy is produced. Surprisingly, a number of micro hydro systems have been known to produce ten or even 100 times more power than wind or solar. Moreover, it is more efficient than the two other sources, as it can run non-stop and overnight.

Biomass

As far as the use of biomass for your home is considered, it usually includes the stove used to heat water or for general home heating. You can use plants, including wood waste, grass, crops or trees to fuel your stoves. It is sometimes reported to pollute the air, but it is still a green option as it produces less pollution than those fossil fuels, which involves burning of harsh chemicals.

So, there is a multitude of combinations available. Now, it depends on your budget to achieve energy independence with help of these renewable sources!

UK Gov is inspiring folks to use these technologies and providing loan under the scheme like Green Deal. If you need green deal in Scotland then contact Green Energy Scotland Limited for your needs. UK Gov is also running another scheme called: Renewable Heat Incentive Scheme. The Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) is the world’s first long-term financial support programme for renewable heat. The RHI pays participants of the scheme that generate and use renewable energy to heat their buildings.

Who should you vote for if Climate Change and Renewable Energy are important to you?

I put party attitudes in two categories. Twentieth century concepts of centralised energy generation, fossil fuel and nuclear technologies and a reluctance to push forward with renewables quickly to avoid the worst effects of a changed climate future, dominate UKIP and Conservative thinking. Decentralisation, strong government incentives for a rapid switch to renewables, lack of sympathy for entrenched fossil fuel dominated companies and a sense that climate change is a fairness issue because the poorest in the country/the world cannot pay to get themselves out of the firing line of flooding, sea level rise and drought characterise the other parties.

Rather surprisingly, considering their appreciation of the need to “be independent and take control of our own destiny” UKIP have not made any link between home grown renewable energy, UK resilience and reduced dependence on energy from “dodgy” countries. Instead, they express intense dislike for wind turbines in particular and “renewable energy subsidies which penalise consumers.” Let’s be honest, generally speaking, UKIPers don’t accept the premise that man-made climate change is a serious threat to our well-being. It’s clear that UKIP MPs will not be voting for any government promotion of renewable energy.

The Greens have an extensive set of policies relating to renewable energy, energy efficiency and energy storage. They want to see “a complete transformation of our energy supply systems to one based on efficient use of energy supplied mainly by electricity from renewable sources, accelerated heat production from renewable sources, improved energy performance of buildings, heat and energy storage, stimulation of research and development, a land and sea framework for development of renewable energy, a diversity of ownership of energy generation and energy democracy. Green MPs would evidently be voting to support renewables, as well as challenging bills that prevent or slow down development of renewables.

Conservatives support the current regime of continually reducing renewables subsidies. They promise to end the on shore wind turbine subsidy (currently the cheapest renewable!) and restrict new solar farms. Eric Pickles has called in nearly all recent planning permissions for on-shore wind turbines and quite a few solar farms. They much prefer on roof PV and would support changes in planning law to encourage this. Conservatives are enthusiastic supporters of fracking and value the contribution fossil fuels make to the economy. One senses their support for renewables is conditional, that they don’t understand the full potential of renewables to growing the economy, and would expect renewables to flourish in spite of, rather than because of, government policies.

A Labour government set up the Feed in tariff, the Renewable heat Incentive and a pathway to zero carbon homes. The coalition have continued these. More recently, Labour have announced policies on energy efficiency, interest free home improvement loans, replacement of Ofgem and freezing energy prices. Labour have a good track record with renewables and have recently stated that they “will support community energy, and explore the huge potential for individuals and communities to create and save energy through community ownership and collective consumer action.” They have not explained the instruments they would use but it seems likely that Labour would provide strong support for renewables.

Liberal Democrat controlled DECC has overseen huge expansion of PV and off-shore wind against Conservative scepticism. Their manifesto includes “doubling renewable electricity and heat generation by 2020, making the UK zero carbon by 2050, a zero carbon bill with a legally binding decarbonisation target for the power sector up to 2030, an office for accelerated low carbon innovation to fast-track new green tech including tidal power, renewable heat, ultra-low emission vehicles and energy storage.” It’s clear that a strong Liberal Democrat presence in parliament is good for the renewables industry.

The economy is the second most important issue for voters so we should focus on the fact that every pound invested in renewables contributes £3.20 to GDP and £1.27 in taxes. The UK could be self-sufficient in renewable energy, thus giving us a more resilient economy. To achieve this, the renewables industry wants stable financial and regulatory support while it matures and drives costs down. I think that’s worth voting for.

As the world’s need for electric power grows, there are certain effects of fossil fuels that require us to look for other opportunities with alternative power sources. Solar power, tidal and geothermal power as well as the classic of wind power turbines has been on the rise in terms of green energy.

Wind power is one of those natural resources that simply don’t go away, so you can make great use of it around your home as well as in terms of powering industrial facilities and so forth. Whether you want to have wind power around your home, in your garden or as part of your landscaping solutions, as a supplement to your power grid are up to you. The following article will cover the upcoming or already developing technologies in terms of wind power and what it has to offer:

Airborne wind power

Makani is working on an airborne energy kite, which is one excellent solution to using the higher altitude strong winds and using their energy with efficiency. Wind in the upper atmosphere are far more consistent, which means any turbines can be used to great benefit, but it will be a while before we see any widespread implementation of the concept beyond the current stage of its work. There is also the Altaeros wind turbine which works with an inflatable, helium-filled shell that allows access to high altitude winds. Projected lowering of energy costs is at a whopping 65% with this technology, assuming it ever becomes widespread and used across the world.

Low-speed winds and power

Another interesting solution is the one offered by Wind Power Innovations. The Wind Harvester is a great, horizontal approach its design, which makes use of aerofoils to create electrical power, even in lower speed winds. It may also work in various wind speed conditions, but it takes a bit of space.

Bladeless Wind Power

The Windstalk is a great new solution which consists of a hollow pole which houses ceramic, piezoelectric discs that are connected with cables from to bottom. As each of the disks is connected, the swaying of the pole and movement of the disks generates a current. This makes them excellent for saving up space and eliminating moving parts, thus making them safer for garden installation, garden landscaping and so forth.

Wind lens

Japanese researchers have been looking into ways to boost the traditional wind turbines and their efficiency up to the amazing three times. A wind lens placed around the turbine blades is expected to give a massive boost in performance for the current designs.

Vertical wind power

This is one way of handling the challenge of wind power, which is seen in the designs of the previous examples. The Windspire design is believed to allow a 2000 KWh for an average of 11 mph wind speed, working with a rotating horizontal design that looks more like an antenna, instead of the traditional look. Eddy turbines on the other hand have a sleek design that allows it to work safe with wind speeds reaching up to the quite serious 120 mph. It has the ability to produce up to 600W of power, which may allow it to work wonders when paired with a good solar array.

This post is by Guest Energizer Sofia Lewis for Gardening Services Gardeners Ltd. who offers garden design services. She is a passionate freelance article writer and blogger. She is inspired by home improvement projects and writes mainly about gardening and landscaping, green living home solutions and other home related topics.

Blandford Hill Wind Farm – at Committee stage, 17th March

North Dorset District Council will be holding a special North Dorset Development Control (Planning) Meeting on the 17th March to make a decision about the proposed Wind Farm Devpt at Blandford Hill, near Winterbourne Whitechurch.

Now is the time though to contact District Councillors to show them there is support for this renewable energy development.

Details of Councillors who sit on the Planning Committee can be found on West Dorset pro wind`s website – here

10 AM @ Winterbourne Whitechurch Village Hall

Reaction to January`s Wind Figures

Another record month for wind but one with a couple of holes in it. The real achievement of wind power in supplying a new record share of our electrical energy needs in January was of course played down by opponents of renewables pointing to intermittency in the output. If you look at the monthly data from the Grid http://www.gridwatch.templar.co.uk/ you do indeed see a couple of days (c. 19th and 21st Jan) that were especially quiet and a couple more that weren’t great. However the striking thing about the graph is actually how steady at between 3 and 5 GW the wind output was for at least 20 of the days in January. If you now look at the data for the other technologies you will see that the slack at the low wind output times was taken up by CCGT or Combined Cycle Gas Turbine generation. This isn’t the inefficient Open Cycle Gas Turbines as is sometimes claimed by those that try to suggest that wind turbines don’t save carbon emissions as these days OCGT are used very rarely and then mostly to deal with the massive spikes in the demand curve or massive fall outs caused by a big failures in centralised coal or nuclear generation or grid problems. Modern CCGT generators are much more flexible than older kit and can deal with pretty much anything the intermittency of wind will throw at them.

So the next issue is whether CCGT necessarily means fossil fuel natural gas. Well no. If we were ever to be lucky enough to get to the point where our wind and other renewables capacity was so high that we had to curtail output because there wasn’t the immediate demand to use the power we could use surplus renewable energy to produce hydrogen and synthetic gaseous fuels. These could be mixed with the normal gas in the gas main to a percentage of in excess of 10% (which I understand would be the maximum percentage for pure hydrogen addition before there were technical issues with burners and other infrastructure). Furthermore stand-alone combinations of wind, solar, hydrogen, syngas and AD/biomass sourced gas feeding to some storage capacity and CCGT dispatchable generation could very conceivably be designed to cope with a much wider range of gas compositions making the use of pure natural gas a thing only of the most urgent crisis in supply.

Currently we are earmarking massive capital investment in Hinkley Point and look set to repeat this several times over in new generation nuclear reactors. If this sort of capital is available it could be being spent on a small number of massive pumped storage facilities on the scale of Dinorwig and a more significant number of small plants such as Glyn Rhonwy http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2013/09/the-time-is-right-for-small-pumped-storage-in-the-uk-developer-says . We do not need to wait for yet to be developed battery storage or smart grid solutions (which do seem set to materialise pretty soon nonetheless) to be increasing our ability to tackle intermittency with storage.

Next is the assumption that Renewables means wind. Wind has to be a major player in any current significant renewable portfolio but, by mixing in a number of smaller players we both increase capacity and reduce overall intermittency. Solar, hydro (not pumped storage), wave and tidal are either already available to deploy in larger amounts or are requiring only limited further development to make them economically viable. Such technological diversity reduces the chances of total renewables unavailability to practically zero even without storage solutions and certainly will reduce the periods of very limited supply to such short timescales that our technological fixes can cope with it.

Next is the Question of better grid links to the Continent. Weather systems track across the continent often West to East so if it is calm here one day it is still windy in Germany and will be calm in Germany tomorrow when it will be windy here. Better and more efficient long distance grid connections such as those based on new generation High Voltage Direct Current technology (HVDC) can make the swapping of surplus renewable energy between countries much easier. The best way forward on this is not entirely clear but “technically there is no big obstacle left to prevent the building of a supergrid. So when could it take place? Actually it is probably already happening. Several of the exisitng HVDC schemes could feasibly form part of a future European supergrid.” http://www.powerengineeringint.com/articles/print/volume-21/issue-6/special-focus-hvdc/how-close-are-we-to-realising-a-european-supergrid.html

Finally there is the question of what we have to do to make using fossil fuels OK to plug the gaps. Although fossil fuels are finite and will run out eventually it is clear that the pressing issue is Green House Gas Emissions so the answer is simple ie Carbon Capture and Storage http://www.ccsassociation.org/what-is-ccs/ . This has been talked about for generations now (ie more than 25 years) but development has been painfully slow because there has been no incentive on those making big money from fossil fuels to invest in it. If those people are made to see that they have to compete with renewables not only in terms of immediate financial cost but also on environmental standards I am pretty confident that they can make it work albeit at a cost and perhaps with limits on the rate of usage of fossil fuels to keep pace with the rate at which we can stuff the CO2 underground or elsewhere. This is fine if fossil fuels are part of a varied portfolio of energy sources including large amounts of renewables instead of being the monster supplier they are now.

Finally finally I must stress that although all these solutions to the intermittency problem are to some degree in the future so is the problem itself except in the minds of the renewables opponents. The variation in demand produced by us all wanting to drink tea during the same commercial break in our favourite soap or the fact that it is cold in winter and warm in summer means that the system will have to cope with intermittent demand whatever our generation strategy and even with a new record being set for wind generation for Jan 2015 we can add plenty more renewables capacity before a calm day will put the lights out!

Jack Olver comments:
"A NY Times article of Nov., 2014 points out that at that time wind and solar were cost competitive with fossil fuels in the US.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/24/business/energy-environment/solar-and-wind-energy-start-to-win-on-price-vs-conventional-fuels.html
These cost estimates don’t take into consideration the world wide damage done by the extraction, transportation and burning of fossil fuels. The US Academy of Sciences put the cost fossil fuels added to America’s health care alone at $120 billion a year and that doesn’t count the cost of global warming, other untraceable pollution and damage to other parts of the world while extracting and transporting fossil fuels.
Fossil fuel companies are currently not held accountable for these hidden costs of the energy they supply. If customers did have to pay those costs or if those costs were deducted from the profits of stockholders and employees renewable energy would seem cheap.
"
February 8, 2015 a 12:27 am

100% renewable and self sufficient North Dorset in Electricity – here`s how

The most recent statistics from the Department of Energy and Climate Change show that North Dorset consumes 290.8 GWh/yr

The last census shows 30,397 households, only 11% of those being flats. Quite a few of these dwellings already have PV installed on their roofs but that number is likely to increase substantially when PV becomes so cheap that it will make better financial sense to install it than pay for all your electricity from the grid. This grid parity (without subsidy) is expected to come about as early as 2020. More than half of houses have close to south facing roof space and it’s reasonable to assume that 60% or so could accommodate a 4 kW array. These would generate around 65 GWh/yr

There are 3,800 businesses in North Dorset including farms. Not all will have their own roof space but all those steel sheds on industrial estates and agricultural barns have low pitched roofs that are viable for PV whatever their orientation. A quick look at Google Earth shows at least 50 big enough to take around 50 kW in the towns and farm barns would probably double that. So I estimate these could generate 5 GWh/yr.

There are already quite a few large and small ground mounted solar farms installed and enough space to generate the equivalent of the districts needs without impacting food production. A reasonably large solar farm is 10 MW generating 10 GWh/yr so 29 of those would equate to the district’s annual consumption.

There are at least 6 small 20 kW wind turbines (up to 20 m mast and 7 m blades) in North Dorset tucked away virtually un-noticed. The landscape could easily accommodate 50 small turbines without travellers and walkers constantly coming across them. They could generate 0.35 GWh/yr.

The River Stour and its tributaries already has 4 hydro turbines installed at mills and weirs with another 5 to be installed soon and potential for at least 6. They range from 3.7 to 89 kW and in total could generate 1.75 GWh/yr.

Now the elephant in the room, which is big wind power They may be very much out of favour with a vocal minority punching well above their weight but the fact is that a 2.3MW on-shore wind turbine is the cheapest source of renewable electricity. It would require 60 of these to generate the equivalent of all the district’s electricity and that could not be accommodated easily. I would say a maximum of 20 could be found a home and 10 would be more realistic and they could generate 48.5 GWh/yr

So North Dorset could generate equivalent to all its electrical need with;

65 GWh/yr from domestic roof tops

5 GWh/yr from commercial and agricultural roof tops

0.35 GWh/yr from small wind turbines

1.75 GWh/yr from hydropower

That leaves 218.7 GWh/yr to be found from a combination of large solar farms and wind turbines. Personally, I would like to see 10 large wind turbines, some of those to be clearly viewed from my back garden. That would mean 17 x 10 MW solar farms to take up the slack.

vince adams comments:
"Keith gives a cogent and totally understandable summary of how North Dorset with just a number of small steps could create 100% of its energy needs renewably.
Think what if every district, County did a similar exercise how simple going renewable could be and how we could see the end of coal, gas and nuclear power for ever.
This is now not in the realms of fairy stories its hard economic sense and will support reductions in climate change temps and give us better air quality all at the sametime.
"
January 19, 2015 a 6:42 pm

vince adams comments:
"What amazingly good news that the Councils are finally supporting local energy initiatives. The Slyers Lane project is excellent will provide a huge amount of energy and at very little cost to the landscape.
Come on people wake up, its our future we are fighting for not a silly nimby reaction.
"
January 14, 2015 a 5:35 pm

Renewable Energy Salesmen?

I used to think that the climate change deniers paid for by big fossil firms and anti-renewable NIMBYs were the worst threats to progress in the fight to cut emissions of GHGs and slow Climate Change but I have recently come across possibly a more sinister and depressing opponent – the Renewable Energy snake oil salesman! These people, either through genuine but misguided enthusiasm or through a malicious wish to fool people into investing in schemes that are about as likely to bear fruit as chocolate teapot manufacture, come up with a way off piste suggestion for a grandiose scheme to solve all of our energy and climate change worries. Now don’t get me wrong I am all in favour of “out of the box” or “blues sky” thinking, but they go straight from some vaguely worked out concept diagram to claims that all further investment in wind or PV or any other low carbon technology are now redundant and pointless. They are one step further into lunacy than the magic bullet salesmen who think that one of the current technologies, be it wind or PV or nuclear, is a one size fits all answer to all our problems.

Why are they so bad? Well at some point they are going to try to persuade people who are concerned about the problems of Climate Change and Energy Security to invest money in these schemes, money that could be invested in home insulation, roof top PV or community wind or hydro projects for example. At least the NIMBYs and climate change deniers are only trying to persuade people to ignore the science and the need for action. The snake oil salesmen nobble the people who have been persuaded to care. They cannot do what is sensible which is to propose an idea for development and try to get universities or industry to make small scale investments to produce trial prototypes or even just to put their ideas out for peer review because they know full well that they will be rejected as deeply flawed or just physically or economically impossible. Instead they launch some small development company and produce a flash looking sales video on U-tube purporting to be a “lecture” on the merits of their scheme and then try to get money out of small investors or crowdfunding. These people are only one step removed from the guy who sold empty plastic boxes with car radio aerials glued to the outside as bomb detectors.

The other really bad thing that they do is to give ammunition to those who oppose wind turbines or PV farms because they suggest that we don’t need to deploy the current crop of well-developed technologies because there is some magic wand solution just around the corner if only the mainstream scientific and industrial cartel will stop suppressing these wonderful inventions. When challenged the snake oil salesman will readily claim to be the victim of conspiracies and prejudice – they can be quite paranoid.

New technologies will come along and in 50 to 100 years we will almost certainly be deploying a markedly different mix of low carbon technologies than we are today but for now we need to deploy as much as possible of the good range of well-developed kit as we possibly can. Universities and big business can pursue the blue sky stuff and take the financial risk. If you have a few hundred or even a few thousand to invest put it into something established and don’t be taken in by the snake oil salesmen!

Vince Adams comments:
"I was talking to a friend this week and he said that quietly Countries all over the World were making amazing progress turning from old energy solutions towards Renewables whereas the UK appeared to be dragging its feet.
This headline caught my eye and I wondered, is that the reason why ? Does UK big business have far to much influence ?
“Electricity customers in the U.S. got good news last week. A new report from Accenture highlighted a potential revenue loss for U.S. utilities of $48 billion per year by 2025 due to distributed solar and energy efficiency”
How do we ensure that the UK is not left behind ?
"
December 17, 2014 a 6:07 pm

West Dorset Pro Wind Group website now live!

Find out what is happening with Blandford Hill Wind Farm at Winterbourne Whitechurch, West Dorset Wind Farm near Tolpuddle and Slyer’s Lane Wind Farm between Charminster, Charlton Down and Stinsford all of which have submitted planning applications.

There is also information on how you can contact us and how you can help lend your support.

A word on Intermittency

Those opposed to renewable`s talk about the energy grid as if it would gallop along smoothly using nuclear and fossil fuels all operating at 100% capacity factor with no need for excess capacity or spinning reserves if it weren’t for those pesky wind mills! Now intermittency and the inability to turn up wind power and some other renewable`s (hydro and biomass for example are what we call dispatchable) is an issue but it isn’t anywhere like the issue that the antis make out. Recently Wind set new generation records and so I went on to the gridwatch site and managed to download a week’s worth of figures for wind and some of the important fossil fuels. Here they are:

So what does this tell us?

During the week covered wind did indeed set new records providing more than 5GW pretty much continuously through Saturday and Sunday.

There is a marked difference between the wind output during Wed-Friday and that over the weekend and into Monday but the variation within those extended periods is relatively minor and the ramp between them is not especially steep.

The Demand curve shows massive changes with huge ramp rates.

CCGT is dealing with the changes in demand by changing its output very rapidly and coal is also being made to contribute some balancing changes.

OCGT is hardly used at all only coming into use briefly during the Thursday am peak (Just below 500 on the X axis).

What does this mean?

Wind is not adding to the problems of peaking and balancing in a significant way. This is dominated by the behaviour of the demand curve.

Assuming reasonably accurate 24 hour weather forecasting the output of wind should be predictable to a good level of accuracy sufficiently far in advance to schedule fossil fuel plants to be off-line and therefore genuinely reduce CO2 output. As the size of the wind fleet grows the variation in wind output decreases as the averaging effect of a numerically large fleet spread across the country kicks in – wind never just instantaneously disappears. Minor variations in wind output will be easily accommodated in the balancing flexibility of CCGT already needed to account for variation in demand.

Wasteful OCGT is not being used in large quantities undermining wind carbon savings.

The curves for CCGT and coal have been effectively lowered by the presence of wind without increasing the ramp rates that they have to follow. This means that a genuine saving in CO2 emissions is the result.

Climate Change Deniers

So right wingers are calling for us to ditch the Climate Change Act entirely and to stop making progress on decarbonisation unless it is matched by other countries. Sounds good? Sounds reasonable? Well No and No in my opinion.

It’s easy to say let’s not bother, let’s just go for the cheapest quickest option and to hell with the longer term consequences but sticking our heads in the sand won’t make those consequences go away. All these arguments hinge on what is likely to happen regarding Climate Change. We are all sceptical about individual scientific results after so many false scare stories about food or vaccinations etc etc but there is something different about the work of the IPCC. It doesn’t just look at one set of data from one scientist it has been looking at thousands of sets of data from huge numbers of scientists on all sides of the debate and has been returning to the data at regular intervals to incorporate new findings. This iterative process means that it rules out the occasional rogue set of results or biased experimentation. We can rely on the trends that the IPCC reports regarding the likely outcomes.

What the IPCC is saying is that scientists are more and more certain that the effects of Climate Change are real, dangerous and being initiated by human actions that we are in a position to modify and that we should be doing so. Climate Change deniers are on a par with believers in a flat Earth. They just refuse to accept anything that isn’t immediately obvious from their exceptionally limited vantage point or that upsets their preconceived assumptions. They grasp desperately at any individual piece of work that casts the tiniest doubt on the consensus opinion like the measurements that show that the recorded temperature figures over the last 15 years or so haven’t risen appreciably. They ignore all the other data such as the diminishing ice levels in the polar regions, the increasing occurrence of severe or extreme weather conditions, the changing pattern of the jet stream or the changing behaviour of flora and fauna in response to the changes in the timings of season changes. They ignore any logical explanation of their pet data that might still be compatible with the consensus view such as the suggestion that the oceans are acting as more of a buffer to temperature rise than we expected which, whilst it buys us some time to make the changes we need, does not mean that Climate Change and global warming do not exist.

The right wing economists suggesting that we do away with the Climate Change Act are like people who would rather burn all the furniture in their house than go out and chop some firewood in the yard. It’s certainly easier in the short term but doesn’t make much sense when you want to be able to sit down or go to bed in the future or need to pay for replacements for all the stuff you have ruined.

Is it reasonable to say that we shouldn’t do anything until we can get everyone else to agree? I think not for two main reasons. Firstly it is a false claim by the Climate Change deniers that the likes of India, China and the US are doing nothing. They are making significant efforts with renewable energy and new technologies and we actually need to try harder to keep up if we are to remain a country that makes much of its wealth by technical innovation. Secondly it is true China and India are also increasing their use of non-sustainable technologies but only because their per capita wealth and consumption is so much less than ours and they would like a richer and more affluent population. We cannot reasonably say that we will not lead the way on sustainable technologies unless we first get our per capita carbon footprint down to the level of India or China’s which I would suggest we need to do by advancing sustainable tech not by making ourselves poor.

The other thing that is being said is that we need to ditch the Act and reject renewable`s because “The lights might go out!” Well firstly I would argue that it is the anti-renewable campaigns that are stopping us building the scale and quantity of renewable capacity that is the problem here and a quick temporary fix through some dash for gas is not the answer. Secondly there is this unwritten assumption that the lights going out is the end of the world. If there were to be some limited phased outages during the 8pm winter peaks of demand during a couple of winters over the next few years would this really matter so much that we need to tear up our plans for long term improvements in favour of short term measures that will push us ever closer to real catastrophe? So you miss your favourate soap on broadcast TV and have to go to bed early. Hospitals and other vital services now have much better stand by generation due in part to the green incentives favouring CHP plants and old people’s homes are better insulated than they were due to the ECO schemes so a couple of hours without power won’t see the temperature drop excessively and you can always watch the program on your computer tomorrow. It is only the politicians who have made this an election losing issue who might suffer particularly if this were to happen. Lastly what are they suggesting doing that could come on line before these suggested outages in 2016-2020? About all we could do is build a few OCGT power plants of the sort that the anti-renewable lobby say are undoing any good that wind turbines do do because of the intermittency of wind. If we want to do something now we should be pushing ahead with the energy saving side of the “green crap” to keep demand down to the levels we can reach and keep building the sustainable low carbon capacity that we will need in the next decade as we reach the 2020 targets and progress beyond them toward true sustainability.

Erik Blakeley comments:
"Anna has a point but unfortunately the news today is full of further calls by Owen Paterson to ditch the Climate Change Act because the National Grid is mildy concerned that there may be power cuts this winter. Ironically the final straws have been the ongoing problems with several of the nuclear power stations and the fire at Didcot gas powered station. Its hard to see what the logic is as no large scale centralized plant can be built between now and Jan 15 unless it is already under construction. There might be some fossil fuel capacity being underused but using it isn’t illegal it just means buying out a larger proportion of the ROCs so there is no need to scrap the Climate Change Act to get a short term fix like that. There might be time to build a bit more dispersed capacity which gives us a choice of fast tracking some solar and wind or building a few inefficient Open Cycle Gas units or internal combustion gas units both of which would be very polluting, expensive to run and would in all likelihood commit us to widespread fracking if we intend to use them as anything but a few months stopgap. There are people who are only interested in the easiest way to make more money. To some degree we all feel that way and that is why the cliche “Its the Economy Stupid” entered common usage. Short term the cheapest way of dealing with the problems we face are probably the dirtiest. This is why the question of climate change does matter. It is the reason why it is worth paying more for rapid decarbonisation now because it will save us much higher costs and loads of suffering in the future. The big tobacco firms spent ages casting doubt on the links between smoking and cancer and telling young smokers why give up something you enjoy now just because there might be a risk many years in the future and we cannot even be certain that there is a risk. They manipulated and bent the science until it was no sort of truth all in the name of profits. Climate Change deniers are doing the same thing now and they have the added advantage that many of the people with power and influence probably won’t live to see the worst results of climate change.
"
October 28, 2014 a 9:19 am

Anna Celeste comments:
"In a way I personally feel that it almost doesn’t matter whether people believe in climate change or not, or disagree about whether it is a natural phenomena or man-made or a bit of both – what matters is that we should all have the common sense to realise either way, we simply can not go on exhausting our planet of its natural resources like we are currently doing, there will be nothing left very soon, and we have to work in balance with nature which means harnessing energy sustainably i.e., from renewable energy sources – IF we cherish the earth, its animals, our people and the future of our own children and family that is. I think that is what matters and that it is worth fighting for : )
"
October 27, 2014 a 2:30 pm

Lets Get Energized with Renewable Energy!

Lets Get Energized is your online guide to renewable energy and sustainable living with the latest news, views and tips plus exclusive special offers to help you save energy and money, beat rising energy prices, combat climate change and be more self sufficient – right now, and for your future...